Something Cheerful for a Change

I should be attempting a re-write of  the conference abstract I did for my supervisor but somehow I can't seem to drum up any enthusiasm for that just now so here are some photos I've just taken of the new sun/garden room.

I think I generally call it the Garden Room these days, although goodness knows what you see out of the windows is even less like a garden that it was before. My sister called it the Summer Room once and I rather like that too.

 

Here goes

 

close up of the blind fabric

 

a cosy neuk

 

the colour scheme is based around the eucalyptus tree and luckily I had just the picture to underline the fact

 

 

 

can you see the leopard?

 

The OH hates this chair and when I ordered it sulked and wouldn't help choose the upholstery. But what the heck? I don't like his living room wallpaper (as I may have already mentioned!)

 

I have to say that we are very pleased with it now its done. If I see a rug that will go that I can't walk past I'll buy it to go under the coffee table and we need lots more cushions as time goes on, but basically it's finished, it's in use and it's a huge asset to the house.

 

And of course the cats love it. They've been using it much longer than we have, but then they weren't constrained by needing furniture and were happy just to sprawl on the floor. 

Out of Sorts with Myself and The World

I'm stressed. The signs were all there but I didn't really take them on board until last week, which it has to be said was a bad one.

The OH was in London for work. He hates being away and although to be honest I can usually cope fairly well with his absence, and have even been known on occasion to whisper the odd 'Huzza for some peace and quiet' that wasn't the case this time, chiefly because I had far too much to do.

 

One of the cats was ill. In fact it seemed very sick, nay, I feared sick unto death. I had to get it to the vets in Kirkwall one morning early and back home again later that same day (Wednesday) which is tricky when you don't drive, that cat is very heavy  and the bus stop is a 10 minute walk away. As it happened lovely neighbours stepped in and helped but it was such a hassle, especially worrying about all the things that could be wrong with him, and wondering how I could break it to the OH if the cat really was sick unto death. It didn't help that the day before the appointment said cat was nowhere to be seem for most of the morning and I became convinced he had done that cat thing and wandered off to die somewhere. He hadn't. After putting me through  a horrible worrying morning he strolled up at about 11.30 looking as though butter wouldn't melt.

 

[And the result at the vets was that he has an overactive thyroid (or possibly under active?) which can be managed with a magic thyroid pill and so far we have managed to artfully conceal said pill in his food on a daily basis and already, much less than a week later, he is much more like his usual self. Which is a relief.]

 

Meanwhile I also had responsibility for feeding a neighbours cat. It was the one I was feeding when I broke my ankle although fortunately this time there was no repeat of that. Less fortunately however there  was  a repeat of the necessity to worm the cat concerned. It's a longish walk if you're feeling not quite the thing and if the weather is bad.

 

The trials and tribulations of my trip on Thursday I have already rehearsed here and I had to go into town again on Friday to return some Inter-site library loans which were due back that day. Don't ask why I didn't do that on Thursday. There is more than one college location in town and the library is in the one at the top of a very steep hill. You've been told Orkney is flat? You were lied to. I couldn't face the hill on Thursday.

 

Meanwhile back at the house the decorator was hanging the ugliest wallpaper known to man in the living room. For some reason which currently escapes me but which presumably I thought good at the time I rashly said the OH could choose the paper for in there, but if I had thought for a minute that he would choose anything so awful, the words 'you can choose'  would never have dropped from my lips. Nor will they ever again. The more paper that went up the worse I felt. And I wans't helped by the reflection that we were paying someone to desecrate the living room in this fashion.

 

But over and above all this, or perhaps more accurately, underpinning it all was the knowledge that I have been out and talking to people far too much recently and its not good for me. I knew really when I started listening to myself babbling to people I didn't know, taking the burden of conversation on myself and forgetting that just because the air is empty I am not obliged to fill it with words. This happens periodically and the cure is a simple one; time on my own, solitude, silence, the non-necessity to engage with others. Give me a week of that and I'm as good as new.

 

Sadly the decorator is back this week (although this is his last job here for this year) and Saturday sees the return of Son No 2 for a week, then we're off south to Glasgow for a few days and I'm planning a research trip to the National Library in Edinburgh. Quiet and solitude seem far to seek, with the result that I'm feeling snarky and grouchy and very very prickly. I'm hoping though that long solitary evenings will help  get me some way towards normal again.

Why Do I Bother?

So,  yesterday I was summoned to a meeting at the place I do my Ph D, ostensibly to be told all about a reshuffle of the  accommodation. Times being what they are, they're having to squeeze a quart into a pint pot, which means Reception, the tea room and two Ph D students all sharing one space, and if I ever actually went into there to work I'd be a bit dismayed because that is going to be one noisy space. As I don't, it really doesn't matter to me, and I was slightly miffed that I had got up at the crack of dawn to sort out the cats and myself in time to catch the eight o clock bus: because in their wisdom the one hour in the morning the local bus company don't provide a service into town from where I live is the hour when almost everyone would want it, ie nine o'clock. The meeting was at 10, so I had to get to town at 8.30 and kill time. When I made a joking reference to making the ultimate sacrifice and getting up so early  I was sniped at because there had been an option of having the meeting at one, which I had said I couldn't make, again  because I had an appointment at home at 2.30 and the buses just wouldn't work for that. So obviously it was All My Fault and it was therefore inappropriate of me to suggest, even jokingly, that getting up much earlier than normal was in any way down to anyone but me.

 

The real reason for the meeting was smuggled in to general chat after the tour of the new accommodation was complete, presumably in an attempt to disguise that it was the real reason. Since I am totally disinterested in office/academic politics and have expressed this fact more times than I care to remember I was no more chuffed at being hauled in for this than for the accommodation tour really.

 

But the thing that really really upset me was being accused by my Director of Studies of 'haranguing' my supervisors at our last supervisory panel meeting. I have not regaled the blog with  various recent tales of woe concerning my Ph D, because a) they will pass  b) they aren't really all that exciting or meaningful to anyone else and c)  who knows who might be reading.  Everyone knows that no Ph D goes completely smoothly and I really have to be very exercised to mention it al all. Like I was  here for example. Names were not mentioned at the time to protect the guilty, but that was the last meeting I had with my subject supervisor. Who I might say appears blithely and supremely oblivious to what he did.

 

Anyway I thought our latest full panel meeting went really well, I was pleasantly pro-active, unlike my usual fairly silent self at these things and nothing was said at the time. In fact I rather thought that my Director of Studies was also of the opinion that things had gone well. So I was a bit taken aback by her mentioning it yesterday in such negative terms. However if asking pleasantly for the feedback from my supervisors to which after all I am perfectly entitled , is 'haranguing'  them, then yes, guilty as charged.

 

Maybe next time I should Wear A Gag.

 

And breathe. Coming later  - more socks. And more sunroom.

Banished

Of course, insofar as you might have given it any thought, you will have considered this a dead cert for me to watch. I thought so myself, very briefly. After all, it's set in Australia, the place that makes my soul sing. It stars two of my favourite actors in David Wenham and Julian Rhind Tutt. Got to be date TV, right?

 

Only it's not. I watched Episode 1, started with high hopes, and felt them drain away, minute by excruciating minute. Of course given that the series was by Jimmy McGovern there were bound to be some JM dramatic clichés. Working class characters, almost all good, worthy, misunderstood grafters, despite being convicts who have been banished to the far side of he world. Soldiers, also mostly working class but obviously bad guys because they have taken the Empire shilling without shame and in putting on their uniforms have become thieves, bullies and rapists. Officers, obviously bad guys from the get go, because that's how McGovern sees the world. And the one 'good - ish' example of the upper or officer class, the Governor, is weak and powerless to change the overall hard brutish tenor of the new colony.

 

This might have been just about palatable, had the plot and conversation not been likewise full of the improbable, the inexplicable and the unsayable. At one point in Episode 1 the Governor gave permission to two convicts to marry, even though both were already married and had spouses back in Blighty. The Governor's totally specious reasoning was that, given they had been transported, their respective husband and wife back in Britain were unlikely ever to see them again, which left them free to marry one another. This then saved the female convict, played by the wooden faced Myanna Buring, from the prospect of being raped by any of the passing soldiery. Now the Minister of  the new colony, rather took exception to this view of the matter and refused to 'marry' the couple. He continued to refuse, even though he was therefore going to be forced to personally hang the male convict concerned and he was about ready to do this, with some reluctance, when his bonkers wife screamed out 'This is a crucifixion' and he found himself a) unable to do the hanging and b) able to solemnise 'the marriage'

 

There was also a sub-plot in which Sandor 'The Hound' Clegane from Game of Thrones was stealing the meagre rations from the werewolf in Being Human, and being allowed to get away with it on the grounds that he was the colony's only blacksmith (really?). Not being enamoured of Russell Tovey (it may be the ears, which I personally don't find all that endearing) I would be quite happy for him to starve to death but as he is emblazoned over all the publicity for the series I suspect he will still be standing at the end of Series 1. And let's all hope that Series 2 never gets made, because not only is this hokum, it is tedious, mind-numbingly, sentimental hokum and a waste of a good drama slot.

 

I suspect Julian Rhind Tutt does every job he's offered, which is the only way to account for his current ubiquity, and his presence here. David Wenham has shown a distressing lack of discrimination in his choice of roles over the past couple of years ( Top of the Lake, anyone?). I don't know how the actor who turned in such a moving subtle and credible  performance in Oranges and Sunshine ended up in this tosh, unless perhaps he had an unexpected tax bill. He really is much much better than this.

Post - post - op check up.

So when I had my post op check a couple of weeks ago the pressure in my eye was slightly raised. Optometrist thought it was probably a reaction to the drops I was using as that happens to about 10% of people who use them.

 

Went back today just to have them checked now I've been off the drops for a fortnight and almost unbelievably for me, everything was fine. Pressure back to normal levels. Hooray.

 

I was so happy I ordered a new pair of glasses to celebrate.

Project 60 Number 7

 

Yup, it's a cocktail. Quite how I have got this far through life without ever sampling a cocktail I'm not too sure, although possibly being not much of a drinker has something to do with it. Anyway it seemed like a fun thing to add to the list.

 

While we were in Glasgow recently I nipped over to Edinburgh to meet up with a fellow UHI Ph D student for a meal, and as she seemed to know a fair amount about these things I trusted her to take me somewhere good.

 

We had a great time, and rounded off the evening with a cocktail each. Since it was my first I went for the very safe Bellini - peach juice and Prosecco, what's not to like? L had a Margarita and insisted I try it, and I can truthfully say that if there's ever a next time mine will be a Margarita too!

 

 

An Uncomfortable Return

We got back from Glasgow yesterday at about 8.00 pm. Once I'd had time to take in what was going on in the house I wanted to turn round and go straight back to Glasgow.

I know we're in the middle of having the hall re-decorated and I know that, especially in a one storey house that's a major undertaking. But really--- does it have to affect every room? The two spare rooms are already full of stuff we had moved out of the hall to allow it to be decorated. The bathroom door was partly blocked by a bucket. Our bedroom door was likewise blocked with the addition of half a bookcase blocking the rest. The stuff in my study had been moved round and the room was mainly taken up with a pasting table. The living room still has no door, the gap between the ceiling and wall in the hall has still not been covered with coving, the electrician has still not been back to put in the new down lighters, the cupboard for covering my electric meters has still not been installed, nor have the new window sills in hall and living room, and my hall and living room carpets have been cut to shreds. There are steps and ladders and buckets and tools and wallpaper off cuts all over the house.

 

I am sick of living like this.

 

Additionally the house was absolutely freezing and the OH's first two attempts to light the fire ended in dismal failure. It started to look like a real fire and kick out some warmth about the time I schwiggled myself round the end of a book case and took myself off to bed.

 

I can't relax when the place is like this, but I have to, because I have no choice. I can't work when the place is like this, but I have to because regardless of the rest, the Gaelic and the study have to go on. And the worst of it is there are two more rooms to be re-decorated before we can start putting the place back together - just in time for summer and the new roof I suspect.

Being a Grown Up - Sometimes it's Hard

I've been a bit quiet lately because we're away, and although some things carry on regardless, like the dreaded Gaelic tutorials, other things, like the blog, tend to fall by the wayside.

We're in Glasgow for a Special Event on Thursday and had originally planned to come south for it yesterday, but life changed our minds for us and we drove down here last Thursday.

This was because a very good, and long standing friend of ours had recently been admitted to a Hospice in the north of England. When she first went there she was very very ill and not expcted to live much longer. Since this development followed very quickly on her diagnosis of being terminally ill I was left with the prospect of not being able to do anything bar turn up and her funeral and cry.

However as it turned out once she was in the hospice she rallied somewhat and so we decided to come south as soon as we could, which was the day after my optometrist's appointment, and we made tentative arrangements to go and see her last Friday.

Which we did, and it was a really good visit. We chatted and laughed and reminisced and she was still the same lovely person that she always was. The only hard part was the end, because never before have I said Goodbye to someone, even those in a similar situation to hers, and known without doubt that it was the last time I would ever see them alive.

If I thought it would do any good I would rail against the universe over the fact that my friend is dying and she's too young, and too nice, and too good and many of us aren't ready to let her go; but it would do no good at all. The only thing you can do in these circumstances is Be a Grown Up and face up to what's happening, and concentrate on what you can do for the other person, if anything, however small. And that's what we did.

But you know sometimes being a grown up is just really really hard.

As It Happens

today we won't be discussing the question of whether there are any books worth reading any more, because I had to go to the optician's this afternoon  for my post-op sign off. This entailed many many drops in my eyes, some of which stained my tears (never had them before) and which generally left me seeing the world in a very fuzzy way. The fuzziness extends to print, TV screens and computer monitors so I am best off leaving the consideration of  reading material to a time when I can see  what I'm writing on the topic.

 

As for the eye, it is healing well, I can stop the drops and although the pressure in it is slightly raised that's most likely to be a side effect of the drops and he's going to have a look in another two weeks just to be sure. But really it all seems excellent and good.

Not a Rose Garden

obviously, because I never promised you a rose garden. (Older readers will see the joke and then want to slap me for the ear worm....)

No, I promised you pictures of socks and here they are. I made two pairs last month

the top ones I made for a swap and the bottom ones (sorry about the glare) were for the OH. I also did almost a whole sock out of a patterned pair for me, but then got distracted by the  need to do the swap ones, and then I sort of realised it wouldn't take me long to knock off the pair for the OH and then that would be two skeins of sock yarn used up just like that!

I did some other knitting too, which is a relief to remember because two pairs of socks isn't much to show for a whole month, but most of that got frogged - or pulled out - for those who aren't too sure about knitting jargon. Hoping for a more constructive March on the knitting front really.

Tomorrow we may, or may not, address the question - Are there any books left worth reading?

Ladies and Gentlemen - I Give You.....

Orange Curd, made by my own fair hand. Although I have never made it before it doesn't make the Project 60 cut, because it's just a variation on the earlier lemon curd, which did.

 

I still seemed to spend far too much of my life stirring a pan and willing the mixture to thicken, but it has all set now. When I sampled it yesterday it seemed too sweet to me, but I am told by the OH that it would sharpen up as it set, so we'll see.

 

I don't know at this juncture whether I will ever make curd of any particualr flavour again, but if I do, it will be a microwave version. There's only so much staring at a pan and worrying a girl can do.

 

And tomorrow - photos of socks! How exciting will that be?